Crop materials, such as straw, hay or any other similar forage or animal bedding, are often baled for storage and transportation. In many instances, it is necessary to break the bale apart as well as chop or shred the crop material in order to spread it for animal bedding or to dispense it as feed.
A machine to disintegrate bales of crop material is sometimes known as a baled crop material processor. A typical machine is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,830,292, which issued to Frey on May 16, 1989. A baled crop material processor basically comprises a container for receiving the bales, a disintegrator often in the form of a rotor with cutters or flails for chopping or shredding the material from the bale, a mechanism including manipulator rollers and/or a belt to direct the bale to the disintegrator and a discharge slot such that the crop material is discharged from the bale processor. The baled crop material is supported and rotated by the manipulator rollers and/or a belt. As the crop material bale rotates, the disintegrator breaks apart the outer portion of the baled crop material first and then proceeds to break apart the crop material towards the centre of the bale until the crop material is completely broken apart. As the baled crop material is disintegrated, the loose crop material is driven by the flails to be discharged from the machine through the discharge slot.
An example of such a typical flail disintegrator for a bale processor is illustrated in cross-section in FIG. 1 and is also described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,109,553 issued on Aug. 29, 2000 to Hruska, which is incorporated herein by reference. The flail disintegrator 10 includes a cylindrical shaped rotor 12 having a substantially circular cross-section. A number of flails 13 are pivotally mounted on the flail rotor 12. The flails 13 are intermittently spaced along the length and symmetrically spaced around the circumference of the rotor 12 for balance. Each flail 13 is made from a solid metal bar having a rectangular cross-section and, in this example, is reverse bent at two points. One end of each flail 13 is welded to a hollow cylindrical section 14 for pivotally mounting by a bolt 15 to a support or tab 6 that is welded to the rotor 12. The other end 17 of flail 13 is bevelled to provide a cutting or tearing edge. The flail disintegrator 10 may further have a twine disk 18 fixed to each end of rotor 12.
The manufacture of the flail disintegrator 10 can be difficult and expensive. One of the reasons is the type of pipe that is available. Pipe that is used for the cylindrical shaped rotor 12 is procured from steel mills and is often found to be slightly bent longitudinally, i.e. the pipe has a crown in it. Also, the pipe may be slightly out of round, has an internal seam and may have a variance in wall thickness around its circumference, which inherently put it out of balance. Further the pipe may be dented or bent during transportation due to its round shape which is more difficult to package.
Since the rotor 12 is round, it cannot be easily manipulated or squared during the manufacture process. Aligning and squaring the flail supports 16 on the round surface can be difficult and inconsistent, and any cuts done to the rotor 12 must be done with a saw, plasma cutter or a torch, which limits the modifications that could be made to enhance the performance of the disintegrator 10.
In view of the speed at which the flail rotor 12 rotates and the stresses placed upon it by the attached flails 13 as they whip through the bale being processed and as they strike back on the rotor 12, the strength of the rotor 12 is a major factor in its longevity. It has also been found that twine from bales tends to wrap itself quite tightly around the cylindrical rotor 12 making it difficult to remove with a knife or an electrical twine removal device.
Therefore, there is a need for an improved flail rotor for a bale processor.